The prices will further ease with the arrivals of the early sown varieties of rabi season by November. Analysing the price situation of onions in the country, Singh said that the total production of onions in the country in 1997-98 was 39 lakh tonne resulting in a decline of only six lakh tonnes over the previous year's level.

He said that this shortfall in production was not the major cause of spurt in prices, rather the growing demand-supply gap for this most commonly used agricultural commodity was the main cause. The demand-supply gap for onions in this country widened to nine lakh tonnes. The demand for this commodity has increased with the growing population level.

He said that the export pull for this commodity was also not the real cause for the spiralling price. Only two per cent of the onions produced in the country were exported. Of course with the suspension of exports, the domestic price scenario is likely to ease to a marginal extent.

Singh said that previous year's prolonged winter adversely affected onion production to a considerable extent. The high summer temperatures, this year further added to the woes by causing huge storage losses. This severely affected the availability of onions. According to an estimate prepared by the National Horticulture Board (NHB), the post-harvest losses of onions ranged between 16 and 35 per cent annually.